Amgen names Puerto Rican exec to top corporate post

Pharmaceutical company Amgen recently announced the appointment of Puerto Rico native Esteban Santos as executive vice president of operations, effective July 25, 2016, reporting to Robert A. Bradway, chairman and CEO of the company.

Santos, who has worked his way up the company ranks, will be responsible for Amgen’s operations organization, which encompasses manufacturing, process development, quality, engineering and global supply chain. He will succeed Madhavan (Madhu) Balachandran, 65, who will be retiring at the end of the year.

Santos, 48, has been senior vice president of manufacturing with responsibilities for worldwide product supply since 2013. He joined Amgen in 2007 and previously held various leadership roles, including vice president, Drug Product; vice president, Site Operations; vice president, Manufacturing; and vice president, Engineering. Several of those positions were held at Amgen’s Juncos campus.

Before joining Amgen, Santos was site general manager for the Johnson & Johnson (J&J) Cordis operation in Puerto Rico. Prior to J&J, Santos held several management positions in General Electric’s industrial and transportation businesses in Puerto Rico, CT, and PA.

Santos holds a Bachelor of Science degree in electrical engineering from the University of Puerto Rico, Mayagüez Campus and a Master of Science in management from the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Hartford, CT.

“Esteban is a talented leader with a proven track record. I’m confident that Esteban and our operations team will maintain our track record of industry-leading performance in serving ‘every patient, every time’ as we expand globally, launch new products and introduce our next-generation of biomanufacturing technologies,” said Bradway.

Succeeding Santos as senior vice president of manufacturing will be Robert Maroney, who is currently vice president of site operations at Amgen Manufacturing, Ltd. in Juncos.